"...so many bears are dependent on human food that some are forgetting how to forage for food and have begun breaking into houses."See, See, bears need a welfare to work program to stop being dependant on public assistance!

I don't know what's worse. That we have to make laws to protect people against their own stupid behavior like this, or that we make laws to protect people against their own stupid behavior.They should just make a law against this and say the punishment is getting eaten by a bear.

I'm surprised there isn't a Snopes entry on this. I've been hearing that 'parents spread peanut butter on kid's face to get cute picture of bear licking him - kid proceeds to get mauled' story since the 70's.

[We have had people who have painted peanut butter on kids faces so the bear will come up and lick the peanut butter off the child's face and get a picture of it," says Bryant.]

GAH!

If I ever saw someone doing that to thier kids I'd report them to child services in a heartbeat! And I utterly loath child service people to the core of my being. Any parent that uses thier kid as friggin' BAIT for a photo op should be shot.

personally, I despise Nature. I'm a techie, I love central air and i'm addicted to the internet. My deal with Mother Nature is pretty simple - she stays the hell out of my living room and I don't strip mine North America.

Ishidan The bad news is, they do tend to insist that the bear be hunted down and killed, it's a vicious, vicious animal!

That reminds me of a woman in Santa Cruz, CA that complained a couple of months ago to the city because her and her family were traumitized by seeing a hawk swoop down and grab a duckling out of the pond at the city park.I mean what does she want the city to do? Sit around with shotguns and shoot the hawks?

Even though I'm getting tired of hearing about and seeing the spongemonkeys everywhere, that cracked me up. It does look like a retarded chicken nugget! My brain never would have gone there. Without medication.

But back to the topic: I think the park rangers should shoot rubber bullets at the people and retrain them. A friend of mine is a park ranger and came upon a group of tourists getting too close to a bear by the roadside, trying to get pictures. So he stopped his truck and strode angrily towards the scene, drawing out his bear spray and directing a blast towards the bear, to drive it off and hopefully put it off of hanging around people. But my friend failed to note the stiff breeze that was blowing and so instead of the bear, it was the group of tourists that got maced. But they didn't complain; they apologized profusely for approaching the bear, thinking that the spray was meant for them and that macing people was park policy.

So it all worked out in the end. Ever since he's seriously considered macing tourists who get too close to wildlife, but hasn't, because the bears are less likely to sue.

Ok as a parent all I have to say is WTF. Now I know some people are dumb but come on. Awwww look Yogi likes peanut butter. Only Grizzly Adams can have sex I mean have a bear eat peanut butter off his ------. One, two, three, It only takes three licks to get to the tootsie center.